Illinois special election reporting: 14th district

Reporting: 14th District Illinois will hold a Special Election to fill U.S. House seat in Illinois’ 14th Congressional District formerly held by Representative Dennis Hastert. The Special Primary will be held on February 5, 2008, and the Special General will be held March 8, 2008.

Principal campaign committees

Candidate committees involved in this election must follow the reporting schedule on page 14. Generally, principal campaign committees of U.S. House candidates running in the November 2008 election must file FEC Form 3Z-1 as part of their 2007 Year-End Reports. See 11 CFR 104.19. However, because the Year-End Report is waived for committees of candidates running in the Special Primary Election, these principal campaign committees must instead file FEC Form 3Z-1 as part of their Pre-Primary Election Reports, due on January 24, 2008.

PACs and party (unauthorized) committees

Because disclosing financial activity from two different calendar years would conflict with the calendar-year aggregation requirements for unauthorized committees, PACs and party committees filing the Pre-Primary report must file this report on two separate forms. One form should cover only 2007 activity and should be labeled as the “Year-End Report.” The other form should cover only 2008 activity and should be labeled as the “Pre-Primary Report.” Both forms must be filed by January 24, 2008.

Filing electronically

Reports filed electronically must be received and validated by the Commission by 11:59 p.m. Eastern Time on the applicable filing deadline. Electronic filers who instead file on paper or submit an electronic report that does not pass the Commission's validation program by the filing deadline will be considered nonfilers and may be subject to enforcement actions, including administrative fines.

Timely filing for paper filers

Registered and Certified Mail. Reports sent by registered or certified mail must be postmarked on or before the mailing deadline to be considered timely filed. A committee sending its reports by certified or registered mail should keep its mailing receipt with the U.S. Postal Service (USPS) postmark as proof of filing because the USPS does not keep complete records of items sent by certified mail.

Overnight Mail. Reports filed via overnight mail(1) will be considered timely filed if the report is received by the delivery service on or before the mailing deadline. A committee sending its reports by Express or Priority Mail, or by an overnight delivery service, should keep its proof of mailing or other means of transmittal of its reports.

Other Means of Filing. Reports sent by other means—including first class mail and courier—must be received by the FEC before the Commission's close of business on the filing deadline. 2 U.S.C. §434(a)(5) and 11 CFR 104.5(e). Forms are available for downloading and printing at the FEC's web site (https://www.fec.gov/help-candidates-and-committees/forms) and from FEC Faxline, the agency's automated fax system (202/501-3413).

48-Hour Contribution Notices

Note that 48-hour notices are required of the participating candidate’s principal campaign committee if it receives any contribution of $1,000 or more per source between January 17 and February 2, 2008, for the Special Primary Election, and between February 18 and March 5, 2008, for the Special General Election.

24- and 48-hour reports of independent expenditures

Political committees and other persons must file 24-hour reports of independent expenditures that aggregate at or above $1,000 per source with respect to the Special Primary Election between January 17 and February 3, 2008, and the Special General Election between February 18 and March 6, 2008. This requirement is in addition to that of filing 48-hour reports of independent expenditures that aggregate $10,000 or more with respect to an election at other times during a calendar year.

Electioneering communications

The 30-day electioneering communications period for the Special Primary Election runs from January 6 to February 5, 2008, and the 60-day electioneering communications period for the Special General Election is from January 8 to March 8, 2008.